| Jim Carrey  AKA James Eugene Carrey
Born: 17-Jan-1962
Birthplace: Newmarket, Ontario, Canada
Gender: Male
Religion: Presbyterian [1]
Race or Ethnicity: White
Sexual orientation: Straight
Occupation: Actor, Comic Nationality: Canada
Executive summary: Rubber-faced fartsmith Jim Carrey is a facebending movie star who delivered his lines through his ass in his first hit film, Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. He was in his early teens when his father, an accountant, was laid off, and all the family's kids went to work to help make ends meet. Carrey worked as a janitor, and eventually dropped out of high school. When the family's finances continued to sink, the Carreys lost their home and lived in a Volkswagen van, traveling to various campgrounds on the outskirts of Toronto. Carrey, meanwhile, made his stand-up debut at 15, on open-mike night at the first Yuk Yuk's comedy club. He bombed, literally getting "the hook" from the manager. Devastated, he spent countless hours over the next two years reworking and refining his material, and when he returned to Yuk Yuk's, Carrey was a hit. By age 19, he was the club's headliner.
As a young unknown, Carrey appeared in a few Canadian films before moving to Los Angeles. His first steady paychecks came as opening act for Linda Ronstadt and, later, Rodney Dangerfield. He was still doing stand-up comedy, and very successfully on the nights when he did his standard impressions and jokes. In his most famous early-career bit, he made thalidomide jokes and crawled on-stage as "Worm Boy," an armless and legless character. But Carrey felt constrained, and often refused to do his act, instead angering audiences with existential yak, song and dance, and bizarre material intended to piss the audience off.
He did memorable bits in Peggy Sue Got Married with Kathleen Turner and Nicolas Cage, and sang and danced in the last of Clint Eastwood's "Dirty Harry" movies, The Dead Pool. Carrey and Damon Wayans became friends when both worked on Earth Girls Are Easy with Geena Davis and Jeff Goldblum. Wayans invited him to appear on his subsequent sketch comedy hit In Living Color, where Carrey played "Fire Marshall Bill", among other bizarre characters. After a few years on In Living Color, Carrey restarted his movie career with three back-to-back blockbuster hits, Ace Ventura: Pet Detective with Courteney Cox, The Mask with Cameron Diaz, and Dumb & Dumber with Jeff Daniels.
Carrey's underrated masterpiece is The Cable Guy, directed by Ben Stiller. He has gotten good reviews but generally lesser box office success for such dramatic roles, including The Truman Show, the Andy Kaufman biopic Man on the Moon, The Majestic with Bob Balaban, and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind with Kate Winslet. Carrey's more comedic hits include Liar Liar with Jennifer Tilly, How the Grinch Stole Christmas with Jeffrey Tambor, and Bruce Almighty with Morgan Freeman. He also played The Riddler in Batman Forever with Val Kilmer.
Carrey has been divorced twice, and confesses that he has difficulty dealing with the more mundane aspects of day-to-day life. In 2003, he was sued by his first ex-wife, who complained that $10,000 per month in child support was insufficient. He promptly increased his payments, in an out-of-court settlement.
[1] Raised a Roman Catholic. As of an interview he gave with Shane Peacock of Saturday Night magazine in June 1993 (published in Toronto), he was attending a Presbyterian church.
Father: Percy Carrey (accountant, d. 1994 lung cancer)
Mother: Kathleen Carrey (homemaker, hypochondriac, d. 1991 kidney disease)
Brother: John Carrey (factory supervisor)
Sister: Patricia Carrey Fournier
Sister: Rita Carrey (bus driver)
Girlfriend: Linda Ronstadt (singer, brief affair in late 1980s)
Wife: Melissa Womer (waitress, m. 28-Mar-1987, div. 11-Dec-1995, one daughter)
Daughter: Jane Erin Carrey (b. 6-Sep-1987)
Wife: Lauren Holly (actress, m. 23-Sep-1996, div. 29-Jul-1997)
Girlfriend: Renée Zellweger (actress, broken engagement, 2000)
Girlfriend: Jenny McCarthy (celebrity, dated 2006-)
High School: Aldershot High School, Burlington, Canada (dropped out)
High School: Agincourt Collegiate Institute, Scarborough, Canada (dropped out)
Naturalized US Citizen Oct-2004
Golden Globe 1999 for The Truman Show
Golden Globe 2000 for Man on the Moon
Canada's Walk of Fame 1998
Wedding: Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes (2006)
Risk Factors: Depression
TELEVISION
In Living Color white guy (1990-94)
FILMOGRAPHY AS ACTOR
Horton Hears a Who! (3-Mar-2008) [VOICE]
The Number 23 (21-Feb-2007)
Fun with Dick and Jane (21-Dec-2005)
Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (17-Dec-2004)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (19-Mar-2004)
Bruce Almighty (14-May-2003)
The Majestic (11-Dec-2001)
America: A Tribute to Heroes (21-Sep-2001) Himself
How the Grinch Stole Christmas (8-Nov-2000)
Me, Myself & Irene (15-Jun-2000)
Man on the Moon (20-Dec-1999)
Simon Birch (11-Sep-1998)
The Truman Show (5-Jun-1998)
Liar Liar (21-Mar-1997)
The Cable Guy (14-Jun-1996)
Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls (10-Nov-1995)
Batman Forever (16-Jun-1995)
Dumb and Dumber (16-Dec-1994)
The Mask (29-Jul-1994)
Ace Ventura: Pet Detective (4-Feb-1994)
Doing Time on Maple Drive (16-Mar-1992)
Pink Cadillac (26-May-1989)
Earth Girls Are Easy (9-Sep-1988)
The Dead Pool (13-Jul-1988)
Peggy Sue Got Married (10-Oct-1986)
Once Bitten (15-Nov-1985)
Finders Keepers (18-May-1984)
Introducing... Janet (1983)
Copper Mountain (1983)
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